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On a fourth-quarter basis, BP chalked up another rise at $2.1 billion (£1.5 billion), climbing from $400 million (£286.2 million) over the same three-month period in 2016

BP is among a string of oil majors benefiting from climbing prices, having seen Brent crude hit $70 per barrel last month - its highest level in more than three years.

Group chief executive Bob Dudley said: "2017 was one of the strongest years in BP's recent history.

"We delivered operationally and financially, with very strong earnings in the downstream, upstream production up 12%, and our finances rebalanced.

"We enter the second year of our five-year plan with real momentum, increasingly confident that we can continue to deliver growth across our business, improving cash flows and returns for shareholders out to 2021 and beyond."

Production levels were the highest since the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico forced BP to sell tens of billions of dollars of assets to pay clean-up costs, fines and compensation.

Deepwater Horizon continued to weigh on BP with $5.2bn of payments related to the disaster in 2017, including $1.7bn of additional provisions booked in the fourth quarter, although the trend was downwards from $6.9bn of total costs in 2016.

Fourth-quarter results were also dented by a $900m accounting charge caused by recently-passed US tax reforms which will reduce the ability of companies to use past losses to offset future tax liabilities.

Overall, the results showed the benefits of higher oil prices, which have traded above $70 per barrel for the first time in three years over recent weeks.

Operating cash flow for 2017, excluding Gulf of Mexico oil spill payments, was $24.1bn, compared with $17.6bn in 2016. BP also reported “very strong” earnings in its downstream division, which includes refining and marketing.

This set it apart from rivals Royal Dutch Shell, ExxonMobil and Chevron, whose quarterly results last week were all dented by weakness in their downstream divisions.

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Mr Dudley said: “We delivered operationally and financially, with very strong earnings in the downstream, upstream production up 12 per cent, and our finances rebalanced. And we did all this while maintaining safe and reliable operations.

“We enter the second year of our five-year plan with real momentum, increasingly confident that we can continue to deliver growth across our business, improving cash flows and returns for shareholders out to 2021 and beyond.”